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When Alex Easton, a retired soldier, receives word that their childhood friend Madeline Usher is dying, they race to the ancestral home of the Ushers in the remote countryside of Ruritania. What they find there is a nightmare of fungal growths and possessed wildlife surrounding a dark, pulsing lake. The problem was lingering trauma that does not go away when ignored. This is such a large aspect of post-shutdown life, especially in schools....

With each new year, Women in Translation Month gets bigger, and it’s a joy to see the bookstore displays, literary events, excitement on social media, special sales, and all of the books published around this time of year, often by small independent publishers who make it a priority to include and increase the amount of books they publish by women in translation. This year’s list is a fascinating mixture of debut novels, some returning favorites like author Sayaka Murata and translator Ginny Tapley Takemori, short story collections, poetry, and so much more so I encourage you to check out these hot summer 2022 new releases by women in translation!...

My answer to the desert island question was always a mix of practicality and whimsy. First, I would choose something massive and complicated—massive so that it would occupy me for a long time, because who knows how long that island stay will last, and complicated so that something new might still be discovered even after multiple rereads. For this slot I would pick Moby Dick or The Brothers Karamazov, both of which are very long and reveal a little more with each reread....

My brain was definitely changed forever, because while my background and life situation are different from Dufu’s (the most obvious difference being she is a Black woman and I am white), her message was exactly what I needed to hear. Dufu tackles the exhaustive and exhausting quest to do everything we (“we” in this case being women, and even more particularly those in heterosexual relationships) believe we have to do....

On my personal book blog, I’ve been rounding up covers featuring teens of color for years, and 2021 might be where I finally have to slow down because the list has gotten so long. That, of course, is a solid problem to have. It’s one thing, of course, to center a tween or teen of color on the cover, be it a stock photo, a photo commissioned for the book cover, or an illustration....

The year was 2014, and I just happened to come across a paperback copy of Someday, Someday, Maybe on the shelves of my closest book retailer. This was also long before I started using Goodreads religiously to plot out my next read, so my process for finding new titles was quite literally browsing bookstores and buying whatever I felt a connection to. (I both envy and pity the bookworm I was then....

How To Start a Teen Book Club You only need two things to start a teen book club: teens and books. I know that seems silly or obvious, but when it’s boiled down to those simple tasks, it feels much more manageable. You have a teen in your life or your house who loves to read and wants to connect with other readers their age. Start with them. Getting one excited member becomes contagious to others who might be on the fence about joining....

One or two hours a day maybe doesn’t sound too much, and for the first few days, maybe it doesn’t feel like much, either. But eventually, it takes its toll. One or two hours a day is a lot to carve out for an entire month when you already have a full life. Maybe dishes pile up in the sink; maybe laundry doesn’t get done; maybe you look up at the end of the month and realise there are friends you haven’t seen since you went into your cave at the end of October....

Let’s begin! “‘Harriet the Spy,’ Tomato Sandwiches, and Breaking Routines” “Middle Grade Detective Books Beyond ‘Harriet the Spy’” “The Appeal of Girl Detectives”

To my glee, Jones included a “Notes” section, titled “Notes at the End of the World.” I read the entry for “That’s Not Snow, It’s Ash” then flip back to revisit the poem. Reading along on my left, my beloved asks if poets always compose endnotes. Some do, I say. That’s cool, my dearest says, and I couldn’t agree more. Jones calls this poem that I can’t get over the “quiet, bewildered heart of the book....

Ladies, if he never replies to your texts writes mediocre pose gives you writing tips thinks publishing should be “merit-based” doesn’t “see colour” He is not your partner. He is a white man from literature. • expects you to clean the house• is trying to rush you into marriage• dreams of being an actor• has a tattoo of an eye on his ankle• wants the immense fortune left behind by your dead parents he’s not your man....

My own work in comics has followed the Goscinny-Uderzo model (although focused around metafictional faeries and anti-fascist magical girls instead of indomitable Gauls). I have three webcomics with my best friend and co-creator Emily Brady — I’m the writer, she’s the artist. We’ve been working on these comics since 2004, and one thing has been very clear to me since the beginning is that for all my procrastination, faffing around, and grappling with writer’s block, the writing side of comics takes no time at all compared to the huge number of hours required to produce the art....

Boseman also brought his powerful, compassionate, wise presence to the world as King T’Challa in 2016’s Captain America: Civil War, 2018’s Avengers: Infinity War, 2019’s Avengers: Endgame, and most brightly and brilliantly under Ryan Coogler’s direction in 2018’s Black Panther. Through him, the impossible became possible. Through him, a whole generation of kids saw proof that they too, could be heroes. Through him, we learned that change was possible, that we’d have to fight for it, but if we fought together there was hope....

As the pandemic lurches forward, more and more libraries are doing something unexpected during a period of time when the digital services they provide are vital: they’re laying off workers or pushing them into alternate emergency jobs for which they’re untrained or unqualified. Librarians in Hennepin County, Minnesota, were told they could be assigned to work in hotel-based homeless shelters, while other systems nationwide like Cuyahoga County, Ohio, laid off or furloughed hundreds of their employees....

I am not a mushy person, but I almost cried. The note was so heartfelt, and maybe because I’m a parent now and know how much thought goes into notes to our kids, I wondered why Alex (or someone) would donate this book to the library, and under what circumstances this occurred. I wondered if the dad knew. I wondered how it got into circulation (typically used books are donated to this library for the book sale only)....

Streaming kicks off on Friday, April 17, at 6:00 PM EST on both Lionsgate and Fandango’s Movieclips YouTube pages. The film schedule is as follows: April 17: The Hunger Games April 24: Dirty Dancing May 1: La La Land May 8: John Wick The initiative is a collaboration between Fandango, YouTube, and NATO and will support furloughed cinema employees. An initial donation on Lionsgate’s behalf, as well as any partner and viewer donations, will be made to the Will Rogers Motion Picture Pioneers Foundation, an organization providing financial assistance to workers impacted by coronavirus in the motion picture industry....

With more than one million copies in print and adapted for the big screen, The Other Boleyn Girl is a riveting historical drama. Read by The Crown’s Vanessa Kirby in this brand-new audiobook edition, it brings to light a woman of extraordinary determination and desire who lived at the heart of the most exciting and glamorous court in Europe, and survived a treacherous political landscape by following her heart. When Mary Boleyn comes to court as an innocent girl of fourteen, she catches the eye of the handsome and charming Henry VIII....

Nestled in the Blue Ridge Mountains in western North Carolina, Asheville is an eclectic city with a rich literary history. Often compared to larger cities like proudly weird Austin, Texas, and wonderfully granola Portland, Oregon, Asheville has a small town vibe with big city ambitions. Exploring literary Asheville will have you visiting local bookstores, national monuments, and historical locations alike. It’s an Appalachian adventure you should definitely embark upon!...

As writer and 15 year Rio resident Elizabeth Bishop put it, “Mexico City and Miami combined is about the closest I can come to it, and men in bathing trunks kicking footballs all over the place. They begin on the beach at 7 every morning—and keep it up apparently at their places of business all over town, all day long. It is enervating, completely relaxed (in spite of the terrific coffee), corrupt....

There’s something about romances where the characters have a “voice-facing” job, talking to strangers over the radio or on a podcast. Often times, their romantic partners fall in love with the voice first, which leads them to a deeper, more physical attraction. At times, there is even an epistolary element thrown in, with characters giving advice to callers or revealing their own experiences to their listeners. It’s also celebrity-lite. The characters work in entertainment and may even be household names, but they lack the stressful experiences of having to deal with paparazzi or tabloid gossip....